


through the tremors

by crystallines



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2018-03-18
Packaged: 2019-04-01 11:36:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13997475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystallines/pseuds/crystallines
Summary: They're always going to be there for one another.





	through the tremors

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Pallas_Athena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pallas_Athena/gifts).



The Potions classroom is drafty as ever.

Luna is late, as usual, and the doors close of their own accord behind her, the resounding slam echoing throughout the chamber. Snape glowers at her, but Luna ignores him—the way she always does—and anyway, the sight of Ginny, sketching aimless designs onto the wooden tabletop and blatantly ignoring the lecture, is enough to alleviate any kind of foreboding she might have.

Luna takes her usual seat next to Ginny, who looks up at her arrival and asks, “Where _were_ you? I was worried I wouldn’t have a partner today.”

Luna rummages in her bag for her Potions books. She can feel Ginny’s eyes piercing through her. It isn’t an uncommon sensation, really, but Luna wonders if she’ll ever get used to it. To the warmth of it. To the subtle skipping of her pulse.

But when she speaks, her voice is even. “Hermione asked if we wanted to meet with Ron and Harry this weekend.”

Ginny puts down her quill as Snape begins the lesson and, yes, takes points away from Ravenclaw. She doesn’t bother lowering her voice as she says, “It’s a Hogsmeade weekend, isn’t it?”

Luna nods. “She wants to meet us at Hogsmeade—a pub called the Hog’s Head, or something? They didn’t say what it was for.” She sighs. “It’s all very mysterious, isn’t it? Like a meeting for top secret agents.”

Ginny doesn’t quite manage to stifle a laugh. Snape pauses only to glare at her—an effort that is decidedly wasted..

“It’s probably nothing of the sort,” Ginny says once she’s recovered, retrieving her quill and scribbling a few hasty notes. “They probably just want to hang out. You know, the way friends sometimes do.”

 _Friends._ Of course. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny—they’re all friends with each other, aren’t they? Luna is simply—extra baggage. The thought makes her sober, and she’s about to let the subject drop when Ginny concedes, “But, you know, it wouldn’t hurt to see. And you _must_ come with us, of course, seeing as Hermione asked  _you_.” 

“Ms. Weasley,” Snape says loudly, jarring Luna to the bone, “since you’ve proved yourself _ever_ so inclined to speak while I’m lecturing, why don’t you tell the class how many times you’d need to stir the—”

“Five turns,” Ginny says without looking up. “Clockwise.”

Smugly, she turns a page in her textbook while Snape fumes.

\- - -

That particular Hogsmeade weekend is bitingly cold. Luna hardly even registers it. It _could_ be her winter coat, except the patches are mismatched, and the fabric was never thick enough to shield her from the wind anyway.

It could just as easily be the warmth of Ginny’s presence beside her, boots crunching in fresh snow.

Honestly, it’s probably Ginny.

“ _This_ is the place?” Ginny asks skeptically as she pulls open the door to the Hog’s Head. It teeters dangerously on its hinges. “It’s awfully…” She purses her lips. She doesn’t finish.

“Quaint?” Luna supplies.

“ _Rundown_ , more like,” says Ginny, “and ugly. But, yes, that works too.”

They step inside, where they are greeted by a small group of their solemn-faced classmates. It turns out that Harry’s planning to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts to anyone willing to learn, anyone willing to resist Umbridge.

“What do you think?” Luna whispers to Ginny as the clipboard is handed around. She’s already visualizing historic coup d’etats she’s learned about in class. “Sounds an awful lot like a rebellion, doesn’t it?”

“Of course it is.” When Ginny’s turn comes, she signs her name on the clipboard with a decisive flourish. “A very _informal_ one, but definitely a rebellion—or, you know, the start of one.”

“We’ll get in trouble, won’t we?” Luna muses as Ginny passes the clipboard to her. The quill hovers above the paper, tantalizingly close. “If they catch us?”

But Ginny only grins at her, dazzling and bright and beautiful. “So we’ll just make sure we don’t get caught.”

In the end, it’s Ginny’s confidence that wins Luna over.

\- - -

Luna sees Ginny a lot, of course. They’re in the same year, and they have Potions together— _double_ Potions, on occasion—and sometimes Luna commentates for the Gryffindor Quidditch games. Their Hogsmeade weekends, the annual journeys on the Hogwarts Express—they spend those together, too.

And now there are Dumbledore’s Army meetings, too.

She catches sight of Ginny in her best moments—glowing with pride after a successful attempt at a complicated spell, brandishing her wand in the air with a whoop, beaming—and in her worst moments, like when she throws down her textbooks in the library after a grueling test with particular force. It doesn’t make any difference to Luna. She loves Ginny and all she is.

She doesn’t mind it. It’s a soothing sort of heat, really. A natural occurrence. Harmless.

She also doesn’t have any plans to do anything about it.

“Do you think you could help me with this spell?”

Luna startles. Just like that, she’s yanked back to the Room of Requirement, and the cluster of students surrounding her, the low hum and chatter as they practice their spells.

She meets Ginny’s stare and wonders how long she’s been trying to get her attention.

She blinks. “What spell?”

Ginny laughs. It’s not a cruel one, and Luna memorizes the sound for safekeeping. “The spell we’ve been trying for the past few _months,_ of course. The Patronus spell?” She twirls her wand between her fingers. “You have it down, don’t you? How did you do it?”

“Oh,” Luna says. “Well, it’s like what Harry said—you just have to think of something happy, and—”

“I know _what_ I have to do,” Ginny says, “but I just don’t know _how._ ”

Luna doesn’t quite know how to respond to that, because she doesn’t know _how_ exactly she managed to coax her silvery hare Patronus to leap from the tip of her wand. She just— _did._ It was a feeling, more than anything, but it was powerful—it was the sort of feeling that spurred her into action.

Half of the class—if you could call this a class, anyway—has already figured out how the spell works. Cho’s Patronus is a swan; Hermione’s, an otter; and Ron’s, a dog.

“What are you thinking of?” Luna asks instead. “Which memory are you using, when you try to cast your Patronus?”

Ginny frowns. “My first Quidditch game with my brothers. When I caught the Snitch, and the game ended early.”

“You could try… _immersing_ yourself in the memory,” Luna suggests. “Recount every detail, you know? How the wind felt rushing by your ears, the cheers from the crowd—”

“ _Luna._ ” Ginny’s voice is strangely fond. “That seems, I don’t know, awfully romantic—”

“No, no, I _mean_ it.” Luna takes Ginny’s wrist. When Ginny doesn’t protest, she guides Ginny’s wand hand upwards, mimicking the same motions that Luna does when she casts her own Patronus. “Think of it, _really_ think of it, and imagine you’re in that moment for a second time.”

Ginny’s eyes slip closed. Her hand is warm in Luna’s grasp, familiar and oddly comforting. She stays still, and Luna thinks if she had her special glasses on, she could see Ginny’s thoughts swirling above her.

She opens her eyes.

“Well,” Ginny murmurs, “that didn’t work.”

\- - -

Ginny doesn’t give up, of course. She’s probably _incapable_ of giving up. During every meeting, without fail, she’ll close her eyes and let her features contort in concentration. And every meeting, without fail, her Patronus fails to appear.

The first few times, Luna tries to help. She guides Ginny’s arm movements, just like the first time. Then she tries guiding Ginny’s thoughts: how to recreate a single moment by painting a vision in her mind’s eye, complete with sounds, textures, color, feelings— _especially_ feelings. When that doesn’t work, she tries to demonstrate.

“It’s like this, see.” Luna holds her arm steady. “There’s no specific angle you have to use—well, at least, I think so. I’ve only done this successfully about twice or so, remember. You just have to let yourself _feel._ ”

When she opens her eyes—she hadn’t realized she’d closed them—there’s a translucent hare skipping in the air before her, shimmering silver, like something from a dream.

Ginny gapes at it for a moment, and then, blankly, she says, “Wow.” She turns to Luna, brown eyes all soft and alight with reverence. “ _Wow._ That was _incredible._ How—how’d you do that?”

Luna shrugs. “The same way I always do, of course.”

It takes a few more weeks of failed attempts before Luna finally caves and suggests, “If you want, we can work on it together, outside of class.”

For a second, Ginny doesn’t respond. They’re alone in the library, studying for upcoming tests for different classes. It’s quiet, mostly, except for the rustling of pages and the splatter of rain against the windows outside.

Then she says, hesitant, “You mean—as in, extra lessons _just_ for the Patronus spell?”

Luna nods earnestly. “Of course. We can do other spells, too, if you want. Or, well, you could just ask Harry to help you out. He _is_ our instructor, after all—”

“No!”

Luna raises an eyebrow as Madam Pince tosses Ginny a warning glance. Ginny lowers her voice as she amends, “No. I mean, _no._ It’s just I learn better when _you_ teach me.”

“There shouldn’t be a problem, then,” Luna says.

\- - -

There is, in fact, a problem, because Marietta tells Umbridge about Dumbledore’s Army and the _Inquisitorial Squad_ , or something like that, is promptly sent after them, and Ginny and Luna never _do_ meet up outside of class to practice their spells.

And then You-Know-Who kidnaps Sirius Black.

“Why should _Harry_ go after him?” Ginny yells. “ _I_ care about him! He’s _my_ friend too, so I’m going. I don’t care how _dangerous_ it’s going to be, but the people getting hurt are  _my_ friends too and  _I’m_ going to do something—”

They’ve stopped in front of the double doors leading to the Great Hall, and Ginny’s eyes have a telltale shimmer to them, but Luna can think of at least ten reasons why she doesn’t want Ginny to go. _Because this is You-Know-Who you’re talking about going against. Because we don’ _t know exactly what he _’s capable of. Because no one _’s ever broken into the Ministry before.____

But mostly, the thought coursing through Luna’s mind is much simpler: _Because I want you to be safe._

“Ginny,” Luna begins, the picture of calm, but Ginny beats her to it.

“Don’t start,” she says angrily. “The others are all saying I shouldn’t go. Because I’m too young, too inexperienced, because I still haven’t casted my _Patronus_ —as if that’s the _only_ valuable spell!—and—”

“I’ll go with you,” Luna offers.

Ginny opens her mouth to speak, but she freezes upon Luna’s bold statement. There’s a moment when she appears to flail for a response, and Luna is just about to elaborate when Ginny stammers, “But—it isn’t—it’s not—”

“Safe?” Luna asks, wry. “That’s _exactly_ why I agree with the others. I didn’t want you to go, either—” Ginny opens her mouth to speak, but Luna finishes, “except there’s no stopping you, really.” She shrugs. “In any case, _someone’s_ got to look out for you.”

“I’m perfectly capable of handling myself.”

“I know,” Luna agrees. “But it can’t hurt to be prepared. No matter what happens, I’ll be there for you.” She glances over Ginny’s shoulder into the crowd gathered in the Great Hall. “I do believe we’re missing out on dinner.”

Ginny still looks skeptical, but she follows Luna into the hall. Just before they part to head to their respective tables, though, she whirls and says, “Will you teach me, then? Tonight?” 

Luna purses her lip. “Ginny—”

“I have to get the spell right, once and for all,” Ginny tells her, “if we’re going to save Sirius tomorrow. The Patronus spell, Luna. You said it yourself: _Just in case.”_

And it doesn’t take much more than that to convince Luna. It’s reasonable, and one rushed late-night lesson could very well save Ginny’s life.

“Would the Room of Requirement suffice?” she asks. “Let’s say—around ten?”

Ginny’s shoulders slump in relief, and she throws her arms around Luna. Luna stands frozen for the barest of seconds, but then she returns Ginny’s embrace.

Neither of them have ever been good with words, she knows. She has a tendency to ramble—it’s why some people call her _Loony,_ because they simply can’t keep up—and Ginny had a habit of finishing things with hexes instead of apologies.

But through this one touch, this simple touch alone, Luna thinks she can convey her thoughts more acutely than ever. She thinks Ginny understands.

It’s a long while before they untangle from each other.

\- - - 

Despite Luna’s misgivings—or _because_ of them, really—she meets with Ginny in the deserted Room of Requirement. 

It is past midnight, and the clock inches ever onward.

When Luna left Ravenclaw Tower just before curfew, she’s fully prepared to spend hours practicing with Ginny until they got it right. It’s worth it, she thinks; she doesn’t think she’s found any other spell this important. Later on this same night, they’ll join the others and break into the Ministry of Magic. All manner of rules and laws and regulations, broken. Their lives, on the line. The weight of it—Luna isn’t sure she can handle it, really, but she steels herself anyway.

This is all for Ginny.

Considering that she could lose house points or get thrown into detention if she’s caught, Ginny is remarkably calm. Focused. Luna studies her dimly illuminated profile and holds her breath.

And then Ginny says, “I can’t.”

Luna blinks, dragged from her reverie. “Sorry?”

Something about Ginny’s expression is... _different._ The lines around her face are harder. Jaw set. Eyes ablaze.

But this time it’s not with passion, or determination, or the courage that Luna has begun to think is synonymous with Ginny herself.

“I _can’t_ ,” Ginny repeats. She runs a frustrated hand through her hair and crosses the room. An armchair materializes, and she collapses into it, defeated.

But Luna, undeterred, follows after Ginny and runs a soothing hand through her hair. “Oh, but you _can_.”

“I’ve tried _everything_ you’ve told me to,” Ginny grumbles. “Reliving the memory, deconstructing it piece by piece, _immersing_ myself in it, recreating the—the _details_ —” 

And that’s just it, isn’t it?

_That’s it._

“Maybe,” Luna says slowly, “maybe it’s the _memory_ that isn’t working.”

“Harry said you have to use a happy memory,” Ginny points out. “I’d say my first Quidditch game was a pretty happy memory.”

“Yes— _yes,_ of course. But it’s worth a shot, isn’t it?” Luna lets her smile form as the idea takes shape in her mind. “We’ve tried lots of things, but we haven’t tried _this._ Don’t you think it’s possible?”

Luna looks up for an answer. When Ginny returns the look, her expression is dubious.

“Think of something else,” Luna insists. “Something happy—well, _more than_ happy.”

Ginny leans back against the chair and closes her eyes. “What do _you_ think about, then? When you cast the spell?”

So Luna considers it. It’s not exactly one concrete memory, she realizes. Whenever she waves her wand in the necessary motions, she recalls how Hermione asked her to meet at the Hog’s Head. How she felt at the first Dumbledore’s Army meeting, surrounded by people who had never laughed at her, _would_ never laugh at her. Hogsmeade weekends with Ginny, grinning at each other from across the room whenever their professors said they’d need partners for an activity, impromptu study sessions at the library.

It’s just—she lets herself bask in the simple feeling of spending time with Ginny.

It’s that simple, and yet somehow it’s also complicated: It feels like _belonging_.

Like home.

“You,” says Luna. 

It’s only when Ginny gapes at her that Luna realizes what she said. She’s not ashamed or anxious, though. It is the truth, plain and simple; and, Luna figures, Ginny can either take it or leave it.

“ _Oh_ ,” Ginny whispers, and all Luna can do is nod.

Ginny clears her throat and gets to her feet. She grasps her wand. Takes a deep breath. Closes her eyes, opens them, fixes Luna with the fiery look that Luna knows so well—the one that Luna has come to love.

“All right,” she says. “Could you walk me through it one more time?”

\- - - 

Ginny _gets it_ , eventually.

After an interval of determined silence, countless failed castings of the Patronus spell, and Luna’s careful encouragement, something finally _happens._

It starts like this: Ginny, waving her wand in a motion no different than the ones before. Her level of focus shows in the lines of her face, in the set of her shoulders, in the whiteness of her knuckles, clutching her wand. 

The incantation, again: She exhales, and shouts, “ _Expecto Patronum!_ ” 

Light bursts from her wand, illuminating the room. Luna watches, slack-jawed with awe, as the particles drift into the shape of a mare, strong-legged and proud, floating a meter above the polished floor of the room. It takes off at a gallop as Ginny snaps out of her trance and throws her head back and _laughs._

She turns to Luna as the mare maps out an aimless itinerary around the room. “Oh, _Luna_ ,” she shouts, “look what we’ve done!”

“ _You’ve_ done it,” Luna corrects her.

But Ginny shakes her head. “No, no—no, this was all _us._ Who stood by me during all those DA lessons? Offered to meet outside of class _just_ to practice this one spell?” She laughs with abandon; Luna finds herself smiling back. “Who’s standing next to me _right now_? It’s _you,_ Luna—it’s all you. It’s always you.” 

“I—” Luna stops to clear her throat. “Well, thank you.”

“No,” Ginny says again. She cradles Luna’s face in her hands, and their foreheads rest against one another’s, and Luna’s pulse goes intro overdrive. She holds her breath as Ginny says, “Thank _you._ ”

From the corner of her eye, Luna catches sight of the mare fading out of existence, almost as if it was never there, but the blanket of accomplishment, of pride—it lingers over the two of them, like the ending of a storm.

 _Except._  

“We should try to rest while we still can,” Luna says, reluctantly pulling away. She misses Ginny’s proximity as soon as she does. “We’ve agreed to meet within an hour.”

Ginny falls back into the chair that the room had procured for her earlier with a satisfied smile. “As if an hour of sleep is enough.”

“It’s better than nothing.”

“And if we’re late? If the others leave us behind?”

Luna perches on the arm of the chair. “They wouldn’t do that, would they?” 

Ginny takes her hand. She cranes her neck to lock eyes with Luna, and hers are half-lidded and deepest brown, and—and _beautiful,_ Luna thinks, just like the rest of her. “You should go back to Ravenclaw Tower, if you want. But I’m going to practice some more. Just because I’ve managed to cast it once doesn’t mean I can cast it under pressure, you know?”

Luna thought that witnessing Ginny’s successful Patronus could have alleviated her anxiety. Instead—perhaps as a result of the ticking clock—it has become thick and suffocating. They’re going to break into the Ministry within an hour, and Ginny has only _just_ managed to master the spell that could potentially guarantee her safety.

She doesn’t want to leave Ginny’s side.

She’s about to voice this sentiment when Ginny adds suddenly, in a voice so soft that Luna almost doesn’t catch it, “But I’d like it if you stayed.” 

\- - -

Before they leave Hogwarts Castle, wands at the ready, Luna remembers a question she’d been meaning to voice. Here in the shadow of the Forbidden Forest, as they’re embarking on a daring rescue mission, anything seems possible—even, perhaps, an answer.

“What do you think of?” she ventures. “When you cast your Patronus?” 

Ginny draws her cloak tighter around herself against the midnight winds. Luna thinks she might be smiling again, but really, it’s too dark to tell.

“Take a guess,” she says.

\- - -

The ministry break-in passes in a blur of shattered glass—wands drawn and ready, spells darting across darkened hallways—

Arthur Weasley, they found, was escorted to St. Mungo’s at the earliest possible opportunity. He’ll be fine, the healers assure them, but there was one casualty: Sirius Black is dead.

Luna isn’t a stranger to the harsh truth of death, but, she supposes—as Ginny crumples to her knees in the Ravenclaw common room, and Luna holds her through the tremors—perhaps there simply isn’t getting used to such things. She didn’t know Sirius all that well, but they all saw him fall through the veil, and she thinks Ginny and Harry probably feel the same way she did when she was nine, when one of her mother’s spells backfired. 

“And it’s starting, isn’t it?” Ginny says as they await the arrival of the Hogwarts Express at the end of the school year. She’s managed to pull herself away from her brothers, and she grips Luna’s arm with an exceptional fierceness. “I mean, it’s _really_ starting. The Ministry can’t deny it forever. The Death Eaters are back. _Voldemort_ is back.” 

“Apparently so,” says Luna.

Ginny looks at her. “How can you be so _calm_?”

Luna lays her hand on top of Ginny’s and lowers her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I trust us,” she confides. “There’s a lot we don’t know, of course, but we can always learn. And if we do, then—” She laughs. “He doesn’t stand a chance.”

Ginny gazes out at the empty train tracks. The telltale rumbling of the Hogwarts Express approaches from the distance, and Hogsmeade Station is overwhelmed with the chatter of students, but Ginny’s voice is clear and defiant and unmistakable when she says, “I believe you.”

\- - - 

They meet again on the train ride back to school in September, largely by chance. Luna hadn’t expected to see Ginny until the welcoming feast, and they had only owled all throughout the summer, never meeting in person, but when Luna opens a compartment door to find Ginny gazing at the passing landscapes from the window—it feels like they’ve seen each other every day for the past three months.

And—everything falls back into place. It’s the quiet interlude after the chaos of fifth year, and _that_  was only the beginning, Luna knows; but for now—

“And there she is!” Luna cries. “Ginny Weasley of Gryffindor—and isn’t she _lovely_ , by the way— _dives_ for the Snitch—and— _and she’s got it!_ Game over! It’s—” She pauses, both to catch her breath and crane her neck to see the scoreboard— “six fifty to five hundred! _Gryffindor wins!_ ”

“You seem awfully excited about this game,” Marietta remarks, her eyes dutifully following Cho’s sullen descent back onto the turf. She still has the remnants of boils on her face, from the jinx that activated when she revealed the D.A. to Umbridge. At the sight of them, a sting of regret pierces through Luna. “This game, which, you know, our House has _lost_.”

“Yes, well.” The Gryffindor team is swarming around Ginny, hoisting her onto their shoulders and cheering her name. Luna doesn’t even bother trying to suppress her grin, or stifle the pride swelling up in her chest. “We lost to a worthy opponent.”

Her magically enhanced voice resonates throughout the Quidditch pitch, earning her several odd glances, particularly from the surrounding Ravenclaws. It’s nothing she isn’t used to, though. 

“You are so fucking weird,” Marietta declares, but Luna isn’t listening anymore. She’s met Ginny’s gaze in the crowd below, and maybe Luna’s just imagining it, but Ginny’s smile looks like it’s meant only for the two of them.

She doesn’t _think_ she is, though.

\- - - 

“It’s good luck to share a kiss before a game,” Luna informs her. “Or after, for that matter. That one counts for the _next_ match.”

Ginny pauses. She has one foot in the locker rooms, and one on the turf; the breeze caresses her black school robes. Her smile, when it comes, is lopsided and teasing. “You just made that up, didn’t you?”

Luna smiles benignly, and— _oh, yes._ There it is. Ginny’s laughter, ringing bright and clear and unabashed. Summer has just ended, but its warmth lingers over the familiar Quidditch pitch, where the Gryffindor team is still cheering in the aftermath of their victory, even as the Ravenclaw team—and the rest of the school—takes their leave, where it’s a simple matter of faith to believe that the oncoming storm is farther away than ever.

Ginny kisses her anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> for anna, who won my fic giveaway back in like...december (rip). prompt was ginny/luna + having a class or the DA together. hope you like this!!! and ty for waiting so long im so sorry!!!


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